Arsys: definition

Arsys is a Spanish company, based in Logroño, that registers domain names and offers web hosting and cloud services. It is accredited by ICANN to register names in generic top-level domains such as .com, and separately by the Spanish registry The central database and system of a top-level domain, or loosely the organization that runs it. Full definition of registry to register .es names. It belongs to the same group of companies as IONOS.

What Arsys is

The company’s legal name is Arsys Internet S.L.U. The letters stand for sociedad de responsabilidad limitada unipersonal, a Spanish private limited company with a single shareholder. Some official lists use the shorter forms “Arsys Internet, S.L.” or “ARSYS INTERNET SOCIEDAD LIMITADA”.

According to its legal notice, the company is entered in the Commercial Registry of La Rioja, sheet LO-12326. The Official Gazette of the Commercial Registry (BORME) records a filing on that sheet dated 18 March 2026.

As of October 2026, the registered office is at C/ Madre de Dios nº 21, 26004 Logroño, La Rioja. IONOS Group SE describes Logroño as the company’s headquarters.

Arsys describes itself as a European company providing Internet presence, managed hosting, cloud computing and information technology (IT) infrastructure services. It says it has been in business since 1996. This explainer does not describe individual products.

Its role in the domain system

A registrar takes domain registration Obtaining the right to use a domain name for a set period. Full definition of registration from customers and passes them to the registry that runs each top-level domain. Arsys holds several separate accreditations, each granted by a different body.

Generic top-level domains

As of October 2026, Arsys holds IANA registrar ID 379 with the status “Accredited”. The IANA Internet Assigned Numbers Authority The functions that coordinate the root zone, IP addresses and protocol numbers. Full definition of IANA registry and ICANN’s list of accredited registrars both show it as “Arsys Internet, S.L. dba NICLINE.COM”. The abbreviation “dba” means “doing business as”: NICLINE.COM is the trade name recorded on the accreditation.

As of October 2026, the company’s own brand domains nicline.com and arsys.net are registered through ID 379. The registry records show that arsys.net was created on 5 November 1996 and nicline.com on 13 March 2000. These are the dates the domain names were registered, not company milestones.

No IANA record shows Arsys running a registry or acting as a back-end provider A company that runs a TLD's technical systems for the registry operator. Full definition of back-end provider for one.

The .es domain

Red.es The Spanish public body that manages the .es domain through its unit Dominios.es. Full definition of Red.es is the Spanish public body that manages .es through its unit Dominios.es. As of October 2026, Dominios.es lists 107 accredited registrars, which it calls agentes registradores. Arsys appears among them as ARSYS, country Spain.

Spanish law sets out what these agents do. Orden ITC/1542/2005 of 19 May 2005, which approves the national plan for .es names, says that accredited agents act before the assignment authority to obtain domain names, work under free competition, and must file the requests they receive in the order they received them.

The two accreditations are distinct. ICANN accreditation ICANN approval that allows a company to register gTLD domains as a registrar. Full definition of ICANN accreditation covers generic top-level domains under ICANN’s RAA Registrar Accreditation Agreement The contract between ICANN and each accredited registrar. Full definition of RAA (RAA). Accreditation for .es is a separate arrangement with Red.es. Holding one does not imply holding the other.

Other registries

As of October 2026, the .pt registry, DNS.PT, lists Arsys among its registrars. As of October 2026, Arsys also appears on the accredited-registrars page of Domini.cat, the registry for .cat. As of October 2026, EURid The nonprofit registry that runs .eu under contract with the European Commission. Full definition of EURid, the registry for .eu, lists “Arsys Internet S.L.U.” among its accredited registrars.

History

1996: the year from which Arsys says it has been in business. The company does not say where it was founded.
19 August 2013: United Internet AG announced an agreement under which its subsidiary 1&1 Internet AG would acquire 100% of Arsys Internet S.L. from the private equity firms Carlyle Group and Mercapital and other original shareholders. The announcement said Arsys would continue as an independent company and brand.
August 2013: the month from which, according to Arsys, it has been part of the IONOS group.
8 February 2023: the issue date of the shares of IONOS Group SE, the group’s parent company.

In 2013 United Internet gave a different Logroño address for Arsys. The registered office has since moved.

Ownership today

As of October 2026, IONOS Group SE lists Arsys among its brands, alongside IONOS, STRATO, InterNetX and others. Arsys’s legal notice describes the company as part of the IONOS group.

As of October 2026, IONOS Group SE is listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. According to the group’s shareholder structure, United Internet held 63.8% of it as of 30 June 2026.

How a single provider can hold two accreditations

A worked example shows how the accreditations fit together:

Someone in Spain wants to register example.com and a .es name with the same company.
For example.com, the company must be accredited by ICANN. As of October 2026, Arsys appears in ICANN’s list with ID 379, so it can sponsor the name at the .com registry.
For the .es name, the company must be an accredited agent of Red.es. As shown above, Arsys appears on the Dominios.es list, so it files the request with Dominios.es, in the order the request was received.
In public lookups the gTLD generic top-level domain A top-level domain not tied to a country, run under ICANN contracts. Full definition of gTLD side shows the legal name, not the brand: the RDAP Registration Data Access Protocol The modern protocol for looking up domain registration data, replacing WHOIS. Full definition of RDAP record for arsys.net names its sponsor as “Arsys Internet, S.L. dba NICLINE.COM”, ID 379.

How it differs from IONOS

Arsys and IONOS are brands of the same group, IONOS Group SE. As of October 2026, they hold separate ICANN accreditations: Arsys under ID 379 and IONOS SE under ID 83. In the glossary’s terms, they form a registrar family A group of ICANN registrar accreditations controlled by one company. Full definition of registrar family: separately accredited registrars under one owner.

The IONOS brand grew out of 1&1 (latterly “1&1 IONOS”) and has been called IONOS since January 2020. When United Internet announced the purchase of Arsys in 2013, it said it would be represented on the Spanish market by both the 1&1 and Arsys brands.

Arsys is a registrar, not a registry. Red.es runs .es, and other registries run the generic and country code domains it sells.

Arsys